Principles for Relationships from God's Word by Claudio Consuegra

How would divorce affect me?

Be gentle with one another, sensitive. Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you. Ephesians 4:32 (MSG)

According to attorney Amy Desai,[i] you can get a divorce for under $10,000 per spouse in lawyer fees if you’re lucky and if both the spouses and their lawyers are reasonable and fair. Of course, this does not include what the divorce does to your standard of living, or if you have to pay child support, or the expenses of visitation. But there are many other areas where men and women are affected by divorce. Think about these:

Life expectancies for divorced men and women are significantly lower than for married people. A Yale researcher concluded that the health consequences of divorce are so severe that being divorced and a nonsmoker is just a little less dangerous than smoking a pack a day and staying married.

Men and women both suffer a decline in mental health following divorce, but women are more greatly affected. Some of the what many divorcees experience include depression, hostility, self-acceptance, personal growth and positive relations with others.

Fighting doesn’t always end with the divorce. Often, anger and animosity only increase when a divorce is final, and the problems aren’t solved by a second marriage either.

Divorced parents also suffer in their relationships with their children. In many cases the noncustodial parents are not able to maintain the level of involvement with their children that they had before. Sadly, the damaged relationship does not always heal when the child becomes an adult. Researchers have found that, “Nearly two-thirds of young adults from disrupted families had poor relationships with their fathers.” A substantial minority of these young adults had poor relationships with both parents.

Just knowing these things should make people try harder to make their marriages work or at least to maintain reasonable post-divorce relationships with their children and former spouses.

Father God, heal our marriage before it is too late and both we and our children suffer irreparable damage.